Speaker of the House

Speaker of the House

Speaker of the House

Speaker of the House

Speaker of the House

At age thirty-nine, Polk now stood for reelection as a
veteran congressmen, with more than a decade of public service
under his belt. He had made a name for himself with his even, fair
and polite tactics and his opinion was respected by friends and
foes alike.

The 1835 congressional election in Tennessee took on special national
significance. Three incumbents–Davy Crockett, John Bell and James
K. Polk–all had national aspirations, and with President Jackson's
term about to wrap up, it was hard to say what would come the following
year during the presidential election. The political winds in Tennessee,
Jackson's home state, would have much to say about how the election
shaped up nationally. Crockett's stunning defeat was read as a
sign of waning anti-Jacksonian feelings and similarly Polk's overwhelming
victory appeared to be a strong endorsement of Jackson. Bell won
a victory for the anti-Jacksonians by being reelected.

As Congress reassembled, Jackson decided that Polk should
be Speaker of the House. When Old Hickory explained that he wanted Polk
to be the party's candidate for the post, the party was left with little
choice but to comply. The next day, in the opening voting, John
Bell lost handily and Polk became the speaker. Jackson's forces had
won again. The factional effort to nominate Hugh Lawson White for
president in place of Martin Van Buren cooled and Alabama even
withdrew its prior nomination for White. Bell, though, remained
a threat to Polk and the two men skirmished throughout Polk's time
as speaker.

Despite a massive Democratic majority, Polk's session
as speaker is remembered as one of the messiest and stormiest times
in Congress. Jackson's enemies (and, by extension, Polk's enemies)
had rallied together to block every move by the administration.
Bell and other congressmen constantly tried to undermine Polk's
authority by questioning decisions and raising obscure parliamentary
challenges. However, Polk's attention to detail paid off and he
knew the rules of debate cold, meaning that despite more parliamentary
challenges in his term than had ever been offered in Congress before,
he was only overruled by the House once–on an issue where he had ruled
in favor of an opponent.

Polk's enemies then tried to upend him using the slavery
issue. They presented a petition outlawing slavery in the District
of Columbia. Other petitions followed, each disrupting the House
and causing impassioned arguments on both sides of the issue. He
settled on a controversial way to prevent further disruptions:
Any and all petitions relating to abolition were referred to a
special committee rigged by Polk to ensure that none of the petitions
ever arrived on the floor again. While solving the problem and
allowing the House to continue its work, the move angered both
pro- and anti-slavery factions.

The slavery issue had been growing in contention for a
long time. Abolitionist newspapers rallied supporters in northern
cities, and the "underground railroad" helped escaped slaves make
it to Canada and freedom. Southern plantation owners argued that
slavery was necessary for the production of cotton and they held
strong to the decades-old custom. For his part, Polk feared what
would happen if the factional divisions were allowed to fester
and grow. He saw the preservation of the Union as paramount in
his work and since the congressional petitions threatened it, he
wanted to rid them from his work.